HKUST was incorporated in 1988 under Chapter 1141 of the Laws of Hong Kong and held its official opening in October 1991. Its Ordinance and Statutes provide for a Court, the supreme advisory body; a Council, the supreme governing and executive body; a Senate; and the boards of the schools. Prof. Nancy Y. Ip is the fifth President and the first woman to lead a publicly funded university in Hong Kong. Prof. Harry Shum chairs the Council.
As of September 2026 HKUST had 21,985 students, 12,216 undergraduate and 9,769 postgraduate, of whom 11,356 were non-local. Its academic units are the schools of Science, Engineering, Business and Management, Humanities and Social Science, and Medicine, the Academy of Interdisciplinary Studies and a joint school. In December 2018 it signed agreements with the Guangzhou government and Guangzhou University to set up HKUST (Guangzhou) in Nansha, which opened in September 2022.